DCI Stoner made murder seem like the most natural thing in the world.

‘That’s what most men would do, right?’ he said. ‘That’s what I would do. When you spoke to him outside your home, did he make any reference to what had happened with your wife? I mean – was he specific? Did he taunt you? Did he talk about the sex? Did he try to provoke you? Christian, mate, I’m trying to help you out here.’

‘And we are going to pause right there,’ my lawyer said in his Newcastle accent.

Kevin and I went to a consultation room down the corridor.

It was nicer than the interview room. Airier, lighter, cooler.

‘They’re working out the charge now,’ Kevin told me.

I felt like sleeping. A short power nap to recover my strength.

‘Christian, did you hear what I said?’

‘The charge?’

‘What the police are going to charge you with at the end of twenty-four hours in custody,’ Kevin said with a trace of impatience, as if I should be keeping up better than this. ‘Stoner is working out if the charge against you is going to be murder or manslaughter.’

We both let that sink in. There were footsteps in the corridor outside the consultation room. Voices, laughter, moving away. Kevin took a step closer to me, his voice very soft now.

‘They’re deciding which charge is most likely to result in a successful prosecution. If you went to the hotel with the full intention of murdering James Caine, or if his death at your hands was accidental. We can reduce a charge of murder to voluntary manslaughter if we can establish loss of control or diminished responsibility. But by your own admission you threatened to kill him some time before you went to confront him at his hotel.’

I felt the sickness rising.

‘No,’ I said. ‘That’s not what happened.’

‘They have you on CCTV outside the hotel. They have a motive. And they have your own taped admission that you threatened to kill him. This is already some way advanced, Christian. You have to understand that they really like you for this.’

‘This man – James Caine – he looked at my wife as if she was nothing. He acted as if he knew her. And whatever had happened between them – even if they had been to bed – he didn’t. He could never know her.’

Kevin Steel shook his head.

‘That doesn’t help you, I’m afraid. The more you talk about what a nasty piece of work this James Caine was, the more Stoner likes a murder charge. Right now he is trying to establish if we are going to claim that there was a qualifying trigger.’

‘What’s a qualifying trigger?’

‘Something that set you off. Something that pushed you over the edge. A spark, a provocation, a moment when it all got out of hand. A qualifying trigger is a defence that is used in a voluntary manslaughter case. It could be something that James Caine said – some sexual taunt, some offensive reference to your wife – that caused a loss of control in you, a defendant with an ordinary level of tolerance and self-restraint. Although I think Stoner fancies his chances of saying that you do not have ordinary levels of tolerance and self-restraint.’ He grimaced. ‘He will be raising that unfortunate event with the Prosecco bottle and the car. They are going to get a lot of mileage out of that Prosecco bottle, believe me.’